Food, Home and Style

The Grand Prize? Free Rent

What’s one way to grab the attention of consumers in an overly-crowded market of coupons, deals, and special discounts? Offer up a free place to live.

Shopping sprees and around-the-world trips have apparently become passé when it comes to company-sponsored contests, since an increasing number of businesses are dangling free rent as the grand prize in seemingly-unrelated marketing efforts meant to attract new customers and draw attention to their products.

From discount clothing chains to beverage companies, there doesn’t need to be any connection to the housing market for free—or discounted—rent to be offered as a prize. Need proof, or just a place to stay? We’ve gathered up a handful of contests to prove our point.

Snapple
The beverage company is launching a promotion to help its customers find recession relief—and to celebrate the return of its Mint Tea flavor—by giving consumers the chance to win $1,500 in rent. Through the end of November, people who enter through Snapple’s contest website will be entered to win one of 30 $1,500 gift cards to be used on rent.

Daffy’s
While not exactly free, the “Daffy’s Apartment” contest was still one heck of a deal. Throughout the summer, the discount clothing chain asked customers to record a 30-second video explaining why they deserved an apartment in New York’s West Village. After nominating five finalists, the store put the videos online and asked customers to choose the winner. The prize? A one-year lease on a furnished $7,000-a-month apartment for just $700 a month. Voting on the contest is now closed, and a winner will be announced on the store’s website later this month.

Qittle
Want to live in Aspen for a year? For free? The text message marketing firm Qittle is planning a six-month contest that will kick off in January, with the grand prize being an all-expenses-paid year of life in Aspen, including a downtown condo, ski pass, and bar tab. Contestants will have six months to sign up online or via text message, with the winner being picked at random on the Fourth of July next year.

Austin Centre Executive Suites
Free rent doesn’t just include houses and condos. In Texas, the Austin Centre Executive Suites is asking the city’s messiest office-dwellers to send in photos of their current space, with one winner receiving two-months of free rent for an office space at the Austin Centre Executive Suites. Entries for the contest must be submitted via the official contest website by September 30th, and the person with the messiest office will be announced as the winner in early October.

Tags: contest, home, office, rent